Chapter 35 Harper-Rayn
HARPER-RAYN
Heavy thumping against the door has my eyes springing open into the bright sunshine of Tuesday morning, and I immediately groan, pulling my blanket up over my head and realizing that I got played . . . again.
My stalker never showed, and that’s just one more time that Knight gets to say that I’m obviously crazy.
“Fucking hell,” I mutter to myself, cringing as I drag my hand over my swollen eyes and press a little too hard on the lingering bruises.
Though at this point, I don’t really think they’re lingering.
They’re basically a permanent fixture on my face.
No sign that they’re going away anytime soon. I look like Frankenstein’s monster.
I spent the majority of my night crying into a tub of Oreo ice cream, and at twenty-eight years old, I can finally understand what it feels like to experience heartbreak.
Sure, I had my fair share of breakups over the years, but I’ve always been the asshole causing the hurt.
I’ve never been on this side of the pain before.
It’s a deep, soul-crushing ache, and without a doubt, I know this is the kind of pain that will leave scars.
There are so many things I could have dealt with in a relationship.
Not seeing eye to eye on everything isn’t a problem.
It’s human nature, but this was too big.
Knowing that the time I was in his arms, crying against his chest as the agony of performing Laith’s autopsy crippled me, he was assuming I was going crazy.
Or when I was bleeding in his bathroom after having my wrists and ankles bound and a knife sliced through my skin like butter, he was wondering which asylum he should stick me in. It kills me.
I thought he was better than that.
My heavy eyes close, and I do what I can to block out the pain.
It took me all night to finally get to sleep, and when I did, I think it was from pure exhaustion, not because I was magically capable of turning off the pain.
I don’t think I’ll ever be able to turn it off.
This pain will follow me around for the rest of my life.
And now at every family function, I will see him.
I’ll have to watch as he eventually moves past this and lets someone else in.
I’ll have to sit idly by as he brings her to all of Mom’s ridiculous dinner parties, and then one day, I’ll receive an invitation in the mail that will gut me.
Loud thumping rumbles through my apartment, and my eyes spring open again, reminding me that someone is at the door, and I groan, throwing my blanket back. It’s probably Izzy coming to tell me all about getting railed on her date last night.
I pull myself up to stand, needing to brace my hand against the mattress as I get up, and as I walk through my small apartment, I can’t help but notice that the pain from the surgery isn’t so bad this morning.
Or perhaps my heartbreak outweighs the agony of being jumped in a back alley, drowning it out.
Just my luck, right?
Making it out of my bedroom and into the living room, I beeline straight for the door, and as I reach for the bolts and chains locking me in, I realize that during my sob-fest last night, I didn’t even remember to lock the door.
How fucking stupid could I be? Though if my stalker had actually shown up and taken me out, I probably would have thanked him for making the pain stop.
Knowing my luck, I probably would have taken the agony right into the afterlife with me like a badge of dishonor, doomed to wallow in everything Knight Slater for all eternity.
Taking the door handle, I give a quick twist before yanking it open, fully expecting to find Izzy. Only as I stand in the open doorway, I stare up at a face I never thought I’d see again.
I suck in a breath, shaking my head, my body going weak with every passing second. “No,” I breathe, my brows pinching together as my heart starts to race. It’s not possible. This can’t be happening.
“Holy fuck, tiger. You look like shit,” Laith says, staring at me with deep concern. “Why are your eyes all red and puffy like that? Have you been crying?”
“No, you’re . . . You’re supposed to be dead.”
“Dead? What the fuck meds did they put you on? Are you good, babe?”
He goes to reach for me, his palm aimed toward my forehead, and I spring back out of the way, fear gripping me in a chokehold. “Don’t touch me!”
Laith immediately pulls back, looking at me as though I’m the one who’s lost her mind, and all I can do is stare right back, my eyes wide as unease pounds through my veins.
How is he here? I did his autopsy. I cut the clothes off his body and cried against his chest, grieving for my lost friend. That agony and loss was too real to have imagined it, and yet, here he is, standing before me as though not a damn thing happened.
Laith looks at me as though he’s staring at a ghost, but truth be told, I’m the one staring at a ghost. This shouldn’t be real. He shouldn’t be standing here before me in a suit, looking as though he’s about to take his ass off to work.
“Woah, tiger. Calm down,” he says, inching closer again, his hands up as if to show that he means me no harm, but that’s not even close to what’s got me spooked. “Is everything okay? You don’t seem like yourself.”
I shake my head, unable to make sense of what the hell is going on. How could he be here like this, standing before me as though he didn’t just die last week? As though I didn’t feel the chill of his dead body. As though I didn’t close up the body bag and slide him into locker thirty-six.
No. Is Knight right? Have I imagined all of this?
Have I worked up some elaborate story in my head?
No, it’s not possible. I felt his cool, dead body beneath my fingers.
Felt the sharp bite of my stalker’s blade as it cut into my skin.
The word left on my ribs is proof of it.
So how the hell is Laith here? Has this just been some big, sick joke?
“No,” I tell Laith, putting my hand up to stop him coming into my apartment. “You’re not real. You can’t be here. I saw . . . I saw your body.”
“What?” he says, his face scrunched with confusion.
“Babe, what’s going on? I just came to check on you.
You’ve been acting weird, and I’ve been trying to give you space to figure out your shit with this new guy, but now you’re being all flirty in your texts again, telling me you wanted to see me, so I figured that was over. I just . . . Are you good?”
I can barely make out the words falling from his mouth as my mind takes me away, swirling with endless possibilities. Laith is dead. I know it with every fiber of my soul, but this person in my doorway . . .
Is this my stalker? Is this him beneath the mask?
He goes to creep toward me, and I jump back again, terror gripping me as my head spins. “STAY AWAY FROM ME.”
“Babe?”
Panic rises in my chest as I grab my car keys off the entryway table and dash right past him, too worked up to stop and grab a pair of shoes or to even close my apartment door behind me.
My bare feet pound against the cold hallway floor, every last one of my internal stitches screaming in anguish, and despite the pain, I keep pushing myself forward, knowing I’ll have hell to pay later, but it doesn’t matter.
Not right now. I have to figure this out. I have to know that this is real.
“Harper?” Laith calls behind me, his voice sounding so real, but I know deep in my heart that it’s not.
As I reach the first flight of stairs, my head whips back, staring at Laith still standing by my door, and it breaks me, but I keep running, hurrying down the stairs as my body screams for me to stop.
But I won’t, this is too important. Too big.
I have to confirm what I already know. I have to see it for myself.
Tears well in my eyes, blurring my vision, and I hastily wipe them away, terrified of missing a step and falling right to the bottom, but I push through it until finally reaching the underground parking structure beneath my building.
My car isn’t in its normal spot, and I have to search, trying to figure out where the hell Knight parked it the night he retrieved it from my attacker’s home. After taking way too long, I finally find it, hidden in the furthest row.
Within seconds, I’m in my car, one hand clutched over my aching stomach, the other pressing the engine’s start button. I back out of my spot faster than lightning, and before I know it, I’m on the road, my windshield wipers flying across the glass as rain pours down over me.
The agony of the run almost has me passing out, but I force my body to clutch onto consciousness, determined to see this through. I suck in deep breaths through my clenched jaw, desperately willing the pain to fade while hoping like fuck that I haven’t pulled a stitch.
I arrive at Blackstone Private Hospital within ten minutes, and after bailing out of my car, I have no choice but to slow my pace.
My body is physically incapable of keeping up with my desperation.
People glance my way, looking at the crazed lunatic rushing through the parking garage, barefoot and in pajamas, but I ignore every last one of them, not stopping until I make my way through the main doors of the hospital and straight to the elevator that takes me down to the morgue.
My hands tremble as I picture Laith’s face.
“No, no, no, no, no,” I mutter to myself, shaking my head as I wait for the elevator.
I can’t stand still, rocking from left to right, and when my trembling hands become too much, I have no choice but to cross them over my chest and tuck them beneath my arms.